For the past five years, the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year awards — aka the Oscars of business in Los Angeles — have followed an annoyingly familiar script.

Really cool South Coast companies get named finalists and they look good in awards videos. But they haven’t exactly lit a fire under the judging panel.

A parade of folks, most recently Lynda Weinman at Lynda.com, has driven back up Highway 101 empty-handed. Since 2005, the EOY hardware has gone to flashier businesses from West L.A. or entrepreneurs with a social message — even if the business plan doesn’t look so great, at least to this somewhat biased observer.

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